


Choose what is right, not what is easy.

by swaneewhistleandkazoo



Series: Lessons in the force [3]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Alternate Ending, Angst with a Happy Ending, Ben Solo is snarky, F/M, Fix-It, Force Bond (Star Wars), Grief/Mourning, Happy Ending, Hopeful Ending, Hurt/Comfort, Kinda, Love, POV Ben Solo, Post-Canon, Post-Star Wars: The Rise of Skywalker, Redeemed Ben Solo, Romance, Some Humor
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-26
Updated: 2020-02-26
Packaged: 2021-02-27 19:08:26
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,308
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22910734
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/swaneewhistleandkazoo/pseuds/swaneewhistleandkazoo
Summary: Post TROS fic (maybe a little fix it).Even after defeating the Emperor, Rey and Ben are not out of danger yet.
Relationships: Rey/Ben Solo, Rey/Ben Solo | Kylo Ren
Series: Lessons in the force [3]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1035117
Comments: 1
Kudos: 43





	Choose what is right, not what is easy.

High above their exhausted bodies lying sprawled hand in hand on the before the destroyed throne of the Sith the roof of the cavern tremors, sending showers of dust and rock cascading down. The reverberations resonate around the ruined arena, cracks splintering up the battered columns and across the floor dangerously close to where their battered and bruised bodies lay.

It feels so easy, so natural just to let his eyes fall back to gazing at Rey’s serene face, it’s like a gift from the force itself. He can’t believe that she’s here with him.

*

_When her force signature had flickered, guttering like a candle in the breeze and vanished from the galaxy it had felt like he’d been torn in apart. Visceral painful love and desperation had given him the sheer willpower to claw his way out of the pit the petty, vengeful bastard had thrown him down in retaliation. Had given him the strength to drag his damaged body over to her and hold her terrifying still against him. The sight of her eyes staring and empty of the spark of life in them with thin layer of dust already settling on them and turning her beautiful hazel eyes cloudy would probably stay with him for the rest of his life. However long or short it may be._

_They were a dyad, the power of life itself flowing between them, if it could revive the Emperor then it could revive someone much more worthy. It has been an easy choice, simple even to reach into the force, so luminous after being in the dark for so long and let his life force flow through their bond, their dyad, to her. For a dizzying breathless moment when he’d teetered on the knife edge of oblivion that would either result in him failing her or in his death._

_Both options separating him from her forever._

_Neither were acceptable._

_For a horrifying heartbeat there had only been his dwindling life force soaking into her slight frame absorbing all he had to give her but it wasn’t enough, it would never be enough, like trying to end a drought with only a trickle, what he was trying to do was impossible._

_Then the force had flooded through him, power to the point of pain, more than he could have ever drawn by himself. So much that he couldn’t control it. So he’d let go, of the fear, uncertainty, his doubts, of anything that held him back and let himself become not a wielder of the force but an instrument of its will, radiating out from his hand on her still chest and the other on the back of her neck._

_Then her rough warm hand had landed on his and there was nothing in the entire galaxy would ever compare to that sensation, the feel of life flowing back into her limbs and the rise and fall of her chest as she shifted in his arms to get a better look at him. For a moment he’d been frightened that the Emperor had achieved his goal of becoming one with Rey and erased her from existence. Then she’d grinned, a crooked impish smile so bright it puts the stars to shame._

_You’re here, you’re really here, is the thought reverberating through their dyad from both their minds._

_It had been so natural to hold and be held, to press his lips against hers and smile so widely back at her that his cheeks ached. He’s home, she’s home and he can feel the light inside him. For the first time in years, maybe even his whole life the voices in his head are silent and roiling emotions they churned up, constantly warring inside of him are, while not gone. They’d never be gone, not fully anyway, there will always be the undercurrent of darkness inside of him, inside her but maybe that’s what it means to be human and choose to find balance._

_He’s okay with that._

_The polished rock floor is suddenly the most comfortable thing his ever felt and he slumps back against it, spine popping pleasantly, now that the danger has passed and his adrenaline is falling his injuries have decided to make themselves known vehemently. He can’t take his eyes of Rey’s worried face as her eyes search his worriedly. She’s petrified he realised, that he might die. Leave her alone again after all they’d been through together. His tongue feels too thick to say any words to her but he tries to send wordlessly to her that he’s not going anywhere._

_With a relived if heavy sigh Rey curled up on her side facing him, one callused finger tracing where his scar had been. Belatedly he can’t help but notice that their lying identically, arms and legs bent at the same angles, mirror images of each other._

_That’s okay though, is his last thought before he passes out, they can balance each other._

*

He’s still so fatigue when he’s awakened by a distant boom that his mind feels like treacle and his hand that’s not holding Rey’s spasms uncontrollably, there is a deep sickening sharp agony in his leg, hip and side that indicated he must have broken something but he doesn’t care. They’d only managed to shift a few metres before they’d collapsed facing each other and Rey had done probably the most sensible thing a person could do after her kind of day and passed out.

She’s still holding his hand though.

Another shower of dust rains down from the ceiling, his mind is slow with fatigue, it shouldn’t being doing that this chamber has stood since the beginning of the Sith so why is it falling apart now? It takes far more effort than it should to turn his head, he can hear the vertebrae in his neck pop and crack in protest in being forced to move after being thrown a long way down a pit by a madman and to reach out un-coordinated and clumsy with the force to try to figure out just why the ceiling is falling down on them. The force provides a steady stream of information and he can feel his brows crease into a small frown of concentration to trying to sort through the chaos outside their isolated little bubble. Engines failing, the distant boom as the Star Destroyer collided with the surface and subsequent fiery explosion sent shockwaves around the cavern and echoed dulling through his skull.

Ah, so that why they were in danger.

Fantastic, a planet going to fall down on their heads and he doesn’t know how the hell are they going to get out of this one?

“Can you feel it?” Rey’s calm low voice makes him jolts him away from his brain desperately trying to calculate the odds, drawing his gaze down from the collapsing roof and back to meet her eyes, which crease up into an adorable little half smile. He can’t help himself from smiling, a full almost boyish grin, back at her.

He can, the planet, the lives of the Resistance and their elation of their survival, the deaths and terror in the Final Order troops, the warmth, the cold, the peace and violence taking place the decaying of the old order which would in turn help nourish and create new better galaxy.

“Harmony” He croaks sounding a little rusty the corner of his mouth lifting to smile back at her.

Her answering smile is radiant “Balance”

He should be surprised, panicked even, be desperately trying to figure out a ride of die plan to escape like his father would have. But after what they’ve seen and done in that cavern it feels almost surreal, a mild inconvenience that huge chunks of rock may fall down and crush them after the overwhelming evil they’ve just faced.

_“Uncle Luke would be proud of me”_ The thought hits him like a ton of bricks and the guilt and grief hits him like a great wave. He’s wasted so much. _“Mother and Father…”_ He won’t just lie here feeling sorry for himself though, he has to work for the rest of his life to complete their work and atone for coming within a whisker of destroying it.

But first they had to get out of here.

Shifting slightly to ask Rey if she had any idea on how, the words died on his tongue at the faraway look in her eyes. “Rey?” he asked gently and reached out gently through their bond. He’s afraid she might be dwelling on Palpatine and the revulsion she’d felt when he’d told about her Grandfather. Dirty, unclean compared to her beloved new family, a contamination running through her veins she couldn’t escape. He understood that feeling, had felt the same way when the truth about Vader had come to light. In retrospect he could have been delivered that news in a slightly more tactful way but like his mother he does tend to be rather…blunt.

It’s almost too easy to open the bond now, maybe it’s because their physically together or maybe because they’re no longer fighting and blocking each other.

And has to stifle a laugh Rey’s not thinking about the Emperor or her utterly tragic lonely past. No she’s thinking about ration bread, coarse, unappetising and with almost no nutritional value smothered with rich melting cheese. It make’s sense growing up on the edge of starvation something, anything to easy her aching stomach was a comfort and that she’d return to that feeling now after the trauma of the past few days. But the image is so outlandish and unexpected it makes him laugh.

She snaps away from her food related musing to glare at him, her brows creasing into a familiar frown. “What?” she retorted at him knowing exactly what he’s knows and feeling defensive, it feels good to be back on familiar ground of arguing with each other.

With a pained groan he rolled onto the flat of his back “Oh nothing.” He gestured up irrelevantly up at the collapsing roof, “A planet is about to fall on our heads and all you’re thinking about is food?”

“What would you have me think about? Our impending doom?” She snipped at him, the lightning blazing around the room reflected in her hazel eyes.

“Well for one thing there are better things to eat in the universe than ration bread, I think you’d be better off eating the seat cushions in the Falcon.”

She squirmed a bit closer probably to glare at him a little better “That…” she said softly “is why you add the cheese.” It’s more than that though, Finn introduced her to the miraculous, to her, ways stormtroopers make their food palatable.

“Not all foods are automatically made better by adding cheese to it!”

“Name one!”

He can’t but the instinct is there to keep arguing with her for the sake of just having her attention on him and he can understand why his parents always bickered playfully.

The argument is so ridiculous, so pointless and weirdly life affirming after everything that they both crack into a fit of the giggles. His cheeks hurt, he’d forgotten that his face could move that way.

Pain flittered across her fine features and she groaned, wrapping her arms around her waist. “Don’t make me laugh” She begged him “Please don’t make me laugh.” It concerns him that she’s still in pain but then you don’t just shrug off dying with a transfer of life energy and a short nap.

And just like that all humour is draining away from them both as the plug is pulled and reality steps in. Neither of them are in any state to haul ass out of here, force or no force and he knows that there is nothing he could say to Rey to persuade her to leave him and save herself. Soberly he reached out and stroked her cheekbone with the back of his finger savouring the sensation.

The faraway look in her eyes is back again, she’s reaching out with the Force he can feel the thrum of it so alive, before she smiled slightly, peace and certainty lighting up her face. As she returned the gesture carding her fingers through his salt encrusted hair. “Trust in the Force, Ben” She whispered “We’re going to be ok”

He wishes he has her faith.

Then he hears it, far of in the distance, hidden in the dust and gloom, someone screaming Rey’s name and the heavy sound of charging footsteps in a desperate search for her ignoring the danger. He can feel the desperation, the fear even from this distance and the beginning of a tingle of an awakening in the force.

“Oh Finn” The ex-stormtroopers name caught in a sob in her throat as her fingers slip out of his hair and he makes a small sound of protest at its loss but she takes his hand again her face full of regret. “I’ve really scared him this time.” Her thoughts flicker shamefully, she’s been so angry and fearful that she hadn’t noticed that her beloved friend was trying to tell her something. How can she tell him what happened here? The truth about her past? Why she’s been so angry the last few days? For a moment she’s so ashamed of herself that it robs him of his breath.

“They’ll understand” She looked at him disbelievingly and he thinks back to when his mother’s heritage had been revealed how yes some people had reviled them but the ones that mattered had stayed. “They will, Sweetheart.”

Maybe it’s his memories of that time or her confidence in her chosen family but she relaxes a little, eyes sliding closed. It does cross his mind that he should be worried about what will happen to him when the Resistance finds them but honestly as long as they get Rey out of her he doesn’t really care.

“I care” she muttered at him and Stars if that doesn’t make him happy.

Closer now, he can hear them as the storm-trooper, Finn he reminds himself, unconsciously taps into the force to find them, he’s still intermittently screaming Rey’s name. Chewie, how the hell is his father’s oldest friend going to react seeing him so soon after his mothers death? Howling and growling and a girl radiating concern and sweetness.

“You know what the problem with this place is” He can hear Dameron say distantly, the sound of that flyboys voice sets his teeth on edge, “Is that it’s…. TO. DANG. BIG!!”

_Really what do people expect,_ he can’t help thinking, Dameron brings out the worst in him. _They’re on the planet of the Sith and the Sith don’t do anything on the small scale._

_Be nice_ Rey’s feelings chide him gently through the bond.

_I’m out of practise_ he sent back _But I’ll try._

_Do or do not_ she told him a little smile playing on her lips _There is no try._

Fair enough.

A beam of light arcs through the dark, making the dancing dust motes gleam like miniature stars and her friend Finn, a little sprinkling of dust settling gently on his dark hair, hurtles into the room hurdling over the fallen masonry bellowing Rey’s name. For a moment he froze in shock and awe, taken off guard by the sheer scale of destruction Rey had wreaked on the room deflecting Palaptine’s lightning back at him.

_Clearly the Emperor lived and died by the when you only have a hammer rule,_ Ben mused quietly and Finn skittered the scattered rubble over to their, well Rey’s, limp forms sliding the last few feet on his knees so he can scope Rey up and cradle her in his arms. The poor guy started in obvious surprise when Rey wrapped her arms fiercely around him.

“Rey” Finn breathed quietly as tears carved tracks down his dusty cheeks and buried his face in her hair. And then the rest of them pile in on the hug, the girl who caused so much trouble on Canto blight, Poe his orange flight suit smelling burnt and sweaty, Chewie scoping them all up in his great furry arms. The force vibrated with the pure chaste love and trust they hold for each other and he felt a lump form in his throat from this touching moment. He doesn’t mind being excluded from the group hug too much, he’s never been a hugger, expect for Rey of course. Plus probably the moment one of them realises he’s still alive he’s probably going to get a blaster to the face. A corner of his mouth twitches up in a bitter smile, a fitting end for the great Kylo Ren.

A warm furred paw smelling faintly of wet Wookie and engine oil, intensely familiar from his childhood press against his jugular feeling for a pulse. Chewie’s familiar furred face fills his vision, a strange sad emotion twisting his expression. For a moment he half expect Chewie to do something, avenge the loss of his closest friends but no Chewie just settles back on his heels and regards him with a carefully calm expression.

And in his heartbreakingly familiar gruff growl asks him if he’s okay?

Does he see the difference in him? That Mother, Father and Uncle Luke finally got through to him?

Laboriously he raised his slightly less injured arm and gave him a awkward semi-cocky shrug. “Nothing a little bacta won’t fix.”

There’s a moment of shocked silence before chaos reigns a cacophony of voice’s shouting over each other and Rey’s arguing in defence of him. Out of the corner of his eye’s he can see the barrel of the blaster rising up, the girl with her lips curled up into a snarl. Rey snaps at the girl to stop, Rose if he’s not mistaken.

Damn he’s going have to make an effort into remembering names now rather than just barking at people and expecting his orders to be obeyed. How tedious.

They all degenerate back into bickering again. He lets the noise was over him. He’s tired, he’s hurt and he’s never been much good a negotiating and he has a sneaking suspicion that if he opened his mouth he’d only make thing worse for himself.

Very faintly he feels ghostly fingers tenderly cup his face the same way his Father's memory had, tracing along where his scar used to be. A hard sharp lump welled up in his throat as his eyes filled with tears. It’s been so long but a child never forgets the touch of their Mother’s hand on them. And for a moment all he can do is let his Mother comfort him. It’s so raw, her not being there. For some reason he always thought she’d carry on forever driven but duty and that relentless restless energy they both carry. “Ben” Leia’s whisper is warm, as loving now as it was when he was a child. “It’s time to leave this place.”

“Yeah Kid” His Uncle Luke sounding of full of pride “The roofs about to come down.”

_“I don’t want to leave you here.”_ He tell the ghostly spirits of his Mother and Uncle, for a moment he’s a frightened child again, scared of the monsters under the bed. He can’t leave the ghosts of his Mother and Uncle in such a dark cold evil place.

Uncle Luke chuckled like he did when he was a student and made missed the point of one of his lectures about the force. “I told you Kid, We will always be with you. No matter where you go.”

Understanding floods through him as the fiery spark in his soul reignites, but they’re slipping away like water through his fingers. Part of him, the dark churning emotions wants to beg them to stay with him, that he can’t do this alone. But at the same time he’s calm, certain of the way forward, that they will always be with him and have already given him everything he needs.

He can’t have been in a trance for long but they are still arguing fiercely. Rey, in a passionate defence of him that he’s changed, that he saved her life and helped defeat the Emperor and everyone else that he’s tricking her. That no one can change that much after the horrible things he’s done.

Which honestly is starting to hurt his feelings.

The argument goes around and around the same points, it’s a confusing, disorganised mess and he genuinly doesn’t know how the Resistance managed the defeat the First Order time and time again from the sheer amount of bickering taking place. Like herding Banthers. 

It would be funny if only they weren’t all in imminent danger.

Rey, pale and shaking with exhaustion, is in danger. Rey, so stubborn, refusing to leave without him.

“We need to leave” His sharp command rings out, through the pointless arguing. He fixed Dameron with a level, calm stare, neither threatening nor permissive, but with steel behind it. A lesson learned on his mother’s knee watching her wrangle arrogant wayward senators. “I don’t care, what you do it me. You can kill me, keep me prisoner or have my assistance in dismantling the First Order. But can we please leave before the roof of the cavern is about to cave in and turn us all into Wampa scat.”

“You’ll give us the codes” Dameron spoke quickly his dark eyes darting up to the roof of the cavern as it shudders ominously. “Locations? Security information? Intel? Everything you know about the First Order.”

“I’ll help you fight them too.” Even he's surprised at how matter of fact his tone is.

Dameron blinks, surprised. Clearly he hadn’t really expected him to give in to his demands after all Loth cat’s don’t change their spots so easily.

Another ominous rumble overhead, a warning from the force screaming in his head and Rey twitched uncomfortable trying to obey the force insight telling her to get out. The blood drained out of Finn’s face, obviously feeling the warning with his newly awakened force sensitivity and without any preamble he knelt down and scooped Rey up, who protested weakly about being carted around like an invalid.

“We gotta go.” Finn told Dameron and Chewie, he titled his head curiously at Ben “There’s something, I can’t…” He stammered a little his uncertainty breaking his inexperienced, unrefined connection with the force “…I can feel… He’s changed and we need him. I can’t tell you how I know this but I do.” He glanced down awkwardly and spoke directly to Rey “Like when I felt…” he paused to compose himself “When I felt you die.”

Tiredly she apologetically patted his chest comfortingly.

Dameron looked torn, conflict alive on his annoyingly handsome face.

“Poe” Finn said with a calmness that belayed the urgency of their situation “Have I ever given you a reason not to trust me?”

Swearing nastily Poe burst into action and unceremoniously hauled him to his feet, the weight of his injured side supported by Dameron’s shoulder and their strange little procession began to pick their way out of this dark ominous place. The blinding jolts of pain struck like lightening, which he can attest to having been up close and personal with one quite recently, with every step. As their assent beings, shuddering jostle of the infernal lift the pain is so blinding that white sparks starburst before his eyes and he has to bite his lip to stop himself from crying out.

He refuses shame himself before the glaring Dameron and Rose and he will not worry Rey. She’ll want to heal him and he’s afraid that if she does it might drain her of what little energy she has left.

“Hurt my people” Growls Dameron in his ear “And there is no where you can hide from me, Ren”

It rankles him to be referred to by That Name, but Exegol is neither the time nor the place to be arguing with the man who is literally holding him up right now. Tiredly he fixed Dameron with a bored stare and lets the irritation written all over his expression speak for him.

Next to his stolen Tie Fighter and Uncle Luke’s arthritic X wing is his Father’s beloved Millenium Falcon. And the sight of its familiar dented hull has never been more welcome. It brings to mind the happier moments in his life, and relief as the old girl is fast and will get them the hell out of here fast.

The surface is in chaos, the great burning skeletons of the vanquished Star Destroyers cast burnished orange light cutting through the overcast gloom of Exegol’s ever present storm clouds. It should looks like hell, a higher circle of hell than the one they’ve just climbed out off, but still hell on earth. But for some reason it doesn’t, it’s horrifying and he’s devastated at the colossal loss of life he’s inadvertently caused.

But instead people, ordinary people, from all over the galaxy have rallied to face the Empire, again.

And they’ve won, again.

So instead it feels a lot like hope.

_I love you_ He tells Rey siliently though the bond. Her warm hazel eyes blinks in surprise at him over Finn’s shoulder. He doesn’t need her to say it back to him their bond has already told him, he can feel their mutual love and her certainty thrumming through the bond, radiating so much life. _Whatever we face now, we will face it together._

He doesn’t know what the future holds, they have so much left to do. But what his Mother, Father and Uncle stood for still stands and the challenges they faced are still there lurking across the galaxy but they’ll face them together.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you enjoyed me throwing my hat into the ring. 
> 
> The title comes from a episode quote from Star Wars: The Clone Wars.


End file.
